Was it natural selection, maladaptation, or human greed that killed-off the woolly pachyderm? It’s not critical now because the species is gone, and I bring it up only as a metaphor to set the stage for this article.

I don’t like to explain an analogy in advance. There may be implications or reverberations from the imagery that might trump the reference. Suffice it to say, this great and noble beast, who roamed these very hills and valleys is no longer around to give direct evidence of what went wrong.

Which brings me to the topic at hand. Lately I’ve been wondering about the predicament of our elected officials. To whom are they ultimately accountable? Whether the scale is the local school board, or Congress, we see without any deep investigation, affinities to the establishment, or private interests, or the sitting administration, that conflict with those of the voter or constituents.

If you asked me at any point during 2013 what kind of year I thought it was, I would have said lousy.  From a personal perspective it was trying to say the least.  Perhaps the brightest spot for me was fulfilling my 2012 New Year’s resolution of launching the new, improved iBrattleboro site on schedule in February 2013 thus marking the site’s 10th anniversary with a decided upgrade.  That felt good.   But personal issues aside, 2013 was an unusually mixed year with surprising news both good and bad.  First the bad.

The Boston Marathon bombing was a depressing incident through and through and while we may never know what really happened there, we can be sure that things like that will happen again. This year saw a continuation of random shootings, in malls, workplaces, and other typically safe places that seemed to pick up steam last year with the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy.  Perhaps in time we’ll become desensitized to such events but not yet.